


Giving Up is Giving In Part 1

by Andrew (Skomie)



Series: Giving Up is Giving In [1]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: M/M, Season/Series 07, Wordcount: Over 10.000
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-02-28
Updated: 2013-02-28
Packaged: 2017-12-03 21:12:40
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 4,515
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/702694
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Skomie/pseuds/Andrew
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Cas finally says what he thought was obvious. Panicking and life advice from psych ward patients follow.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The Words We Say

   Some things Cas will never comprehend so he no longer tries to. Like the way the Winchesters had let him fall back into step with them, particularly the younger, baffled the fallen angel. After the long crooked path he'd walked it was astounding that much of anything still managed to dig in deep and hurt like it used to, like before. The first time he heard, 'Cas,' tumble effortlessly out of full lips under jade eyes after he had played God Castiel had barely been able to suppress the flinch that shot up his spine. Said as if it was simple. A lot had happened, been built up and broken again since he earned that subtle seal of approval from Dean. He hadn't been so blinded by events that he couldn't see how far things have stretched between them since then.

    "What's a little apocalypse between family?" Sam tried to joke when the weight of not mentioning it had started snapping bones.

    "Family," Cas repeated back as if of all the words in all of the languages he was programmed to know this was the one installed incorrectly.

    Sam didn't get it, rarely did when it came to Cas, and huffed out a laugh. His absurdly large hand came crashing down, slamming onto his shoulder. "Of course, Cas." Like anything could be that obvious now.

    Dean's pupils were like lasers concentrated somewhere south of Cas' eyes, his throat working hard to swallow beneath stubble and pale skin. Dean Winchester. Still a puzzle - parts fitting together in a way Cas is only beginning to understand, creating a complete picture he desperately wants to see. Only he can't help feeling like he keeps stealing pieces of Dean. Or at least pushing him to the point where he's squirreling them away as not to lose them. Dean's strong, stronger than Heaven had bet on, but it's a matter of structural integrity at this point. You poke so many holes in a wall and it's no longer keeping what it should out or up no matter what it's made of.

    Sam tells him to stay in touch when the room falls quiet for too long, meaning it. He shares a look with his brother the angel doesn't bother to interrupt before walking out of the room. He's left with Dean whose hand is gripping his keys so tightly his palm is going to bare their mark for hours.

    "We have to go," Dean says finally, as if this needs saying.

    Cas nods and thinks, 'I know you do - to try to clean up my mess,' but says, "I'm sorry I can't help you," instead. He wants to tell Dean that he wishes he wasn't so ruined, that everything wasn't. He doesn't know if he has that right.

    Dean looks to the door, to the world Cas broke and his brother waiting out in it. He's gritting his teeth, jaw muscles clenched and angry. Cas doesn't have to be able to read his mind to know he's biting back an argument about the subtle difference between 'can't' and 'won't'.

    "Right," he breathes out in a tone more tired and less angry than expected. "I'll see ya, Cas."

    Cas wants to say a lot of things but his better judgment has sat on the mute button. So he watches as his once charge strides past him, doesn't miss the way his whole body jerks to a halt in the door frame as if it wasn't planned. Can't stop seeing the way a shudder that starts in Dean's knees ricochets up his body until its lodged heavy and hard in the lines of his shoulders, stuck. Barely turning back to face him, profile over lit by the hospital lights behind him Dean jabs a finger in Cas' direction, accusingly.

    "Don't disappear again or I swear to God." It might be a plea or a threat but it isn't a request.

    The possibilities for the end of that sentence screaming too loud inside of his chest to answer, Cas simply nods. Dean doesn't see it. Dean is gone. Down the hall, through the series of doors, getting into a car, to clean up the mess. He wants to run after him. Damn them all and say the words pounding inside of his skull. Hold on tight to cracked leather and try to explain how the world ending inside of him shook loose too much for him to keep it swallowed. Get in that car and fix this himself. But he's seen what happens when he touches something and he doesn't want to be the thing that makes Dean finally crumble.

    So he starts and does what he can. He takes care of the bees.

 

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

 

    Dean hadn't prayed for him. There was no reason to think anything was wrong and, with unusual certainty, he knew he wasn't needed. This doesn't stop the heart he no longer considers borrowed to flare with relief when Sam texts him back almost immediately with the address to a motel in Montana. In an instant he's standing in front of Dean. Dean who is shirtless, sewing up a torn open bicep, another jagged soon-to-be scar. He doesn't jump at Cas' sudden appearance like he used to. It's a quick snap of muscle, more memory than intent, like his heart isn't in it. Cas doesn't know which is more painful, the thought of being something normal to Dean or the way the hunter seems to radiate in a run down motel room with more lights burned out than not. Doesn't know which he'll be condemned for.

    "What's going on, Cas?" He asks, looking up from his handiwork, expression slightly pained.

    He doesn't know the answer. He doesn't think there is one.

    "I wanted to see if you had made any progress on-"

    Castiel briefly wonders what will happen if he were to reach out and attempt to heal, to smooth out the red tear on Dean's arm back into freckled porcelain. He doesn't know what Dean will do if he touches him and the human will heal in time without him. He always has.

    "You're checking up on us? Looking for a status report?" Dean laughs like he's never heard anything less funny.

    "No," sounding the word out slowly as if tiptoeing, the conversation full of landmines.

    "Then if you're here to offer a hand-"

    "No," he says again, this time sure of it.

    Dean sighs, pulls his shirt back on and some of the air that the room had been missing starts streaming back in. Dean stares at him, eyes wide open and Cas realizes this man is as terrified as he is. A fear that has sunk into their skeletons and threatening to crack them both apart if something doesn't give.

    "Cas - I can't," he starts and abandons, scrubbing a worn hand over his face. "I don't know what I'm doing anymore. Bobby's gone and you're on the bench. We're clueless, man. We, I need..." but Cas won't get to hear what Dean needs. The walls are already clicking back into place behind Dean's eyes when he finishes with, "Why are you even here, Cas?"

    Without thinking, probably because he doesn't, Cas says, "I'm in love with you, Dean." Like its simple.

    Cas still isn't great with nailing facial expressions but he knows surprise fairly well. He can appreciate that disgust or anger doesn't make an appearance - that he sees, anyway. It looks like someone walked by and pulled all of Dean's muscle strings too tight, he may not even be breathing, and Cas thinks, 'How many times have I tried to shut you up, Dean Winchester? All this time and all it took was this.'

    Castiel goes to say something but once his mouth is open he realizes he's not sure where to begin. 'How could you not have known?' is lingering near the tip of his tongue when he hears Sam shuffle for his keys at the door.

    He looks at Dean, takes the sight of him in. He's still beautiful, the one constant in Castiel's life now. Cas lifts his hands, palms towards Dean, and tries standing in a way that he hopes looks apologetic but he can feel the bleeding of acceptance.

    "Don't you fucking dare!-" is all Dean gets out, barely managing to scramble off the bed, before Cas is gone.


	2. The Sound of Snapping

   Realistically, the motel he left Dean in is about a 26 hour drive from Castiel's hospital and yet he's still a little shocked when the clock ticks past the 17 hour mark and no one in a flannel over-shirt has slammed their way into his room yet. Cas knew Dean was coming the second he left, knows it because he knows how angry Dean is. Could see the way it twisted up around him, strangling, as he angled himself here. It’s not question of caring, this Winchester isn't currently breaking multiple traffic laws to get to him out of love. Not this time. The only emotion this man is running headlong towards is anger.

    Cas thinks about leaving. Wonders if it'd be easier for all of them if he wasn't here for Dean to find but for the life of him he can't think of a single place to go. He's not too far gone yet to miss how odd that is. How strange _._ How _human._ All the places Cas has been and he can't conjure up the will to pick one. He thinks about the feats of perseverance in Egypt. The determination plotted in Antartica. The definition of loyalty in a too small baseball stadium in Boston. He could go, read their stories in chiseled stone and kicked up dirt. He could go anywhere. If there wasn’t something just shy of concrete cementing him to the one place Dean will certainly find him.

   He imagines what would happen if he just took off running the second Dean pushes his way into Cas' room - if Dean would chase him up and down the halls screaming his name or if he'd just take out his gun and shoot him in the back. Both are equally amusing images but it’s not till Dean fills up the door frame, blocking his only exit, that the smile he hadn't realized was there slips off of his face.

  There's a pause filled to the brim with an incredibly loud silence. Cas, in all his stupidity, thinks of saying, _'I do Dean, I swear. I thought you knew.'_ There's no time to consider it before Dean's stalking across the floor, fists clenched and quickly raising. Cas ducks the first swing and manages to grab Dean's wrist as the second sails towards him. He holds it tight between his fingers. He deserves the hit, would welcome it if it would end in anything other than crushed knuckles.

   Dean's all but growling and Cas says, too quietly for the situation, "Please stop. You'll hurt yourself."

    Dean wrenches his arm out of the grasp, angel letting him with resignation of someone who has spent too long in camp Winchester. Cas knows that if Dean's set on beating up a brick wall then all you can do is figure out the fastest route to the ER and wait.

    He doesn't throw another punch. Just stands there, shoulders hunched and tense. His eyes blazing, breathing heavy in a perfect rhythm that’s echoing off the walls in the suddenly too small room. Cas has seen the same image on many battle fields in his lifetime. He doesn't know if Dean considers him enemy or comrade anymore. He misses the brief time he had knowing they were, at least, fighting together.

    "You had no right," Dean tells him, voice crackling.

    Cas won't argue despite not knowing specifically what Dean's referring to. He did not have the right to fall in love with his charge as he butchered their way out of Hell. Had no right to question the Father, to leave his kin for the rag-tag team Free Will. To bring Sam back, to play God, poke at Purgatory. Cas didn't have the right to just about anything he's done in the last four years. Whatever Dean's talking about he's almost automatically correct by default.

    "It has never been my intention to make things worse for you," he says because it is true. It's the worst part of all of it, Cas thinks, that he was always trying to help. He's failed so miserably that it must be hard to believe but he hopes Dean knows this. Knows that Cas has tried his best for whatever grain of salt it's worth.

    "Take it back then," Dean pleads, "Just tell me your motherboard short circuited and we can all just pretend it was another part of this fucking nightmare."

    _'Is that how it works?'_  Cas wants to ask. He could tell Dean that he misunderstood, it was a simple miscalculation in translation, and Dean will accept this and move on. He could so easily forget what Cas had told him in a dingy motel room during a violent fit of honesty.

    "I won't lie to you," and he's already cringing around the words, before Dean has the chance to scoff.

    "Bullshit time to come up with that rule."

    Cas snaps. He was no right to, but he does. Another thing to add to the list, right down at the bottom.

    This is his problem, the source. Dean's never ending perfect ability to get into his blood stream and make him do what he does not want to the most. Dean who renamed him, lent him a new cause, and buried a kernel of humanity inside of him deeper than his grace. This would be Dean's fault if Cas had not seen all this happening and let him, if Cas had not felt himself falling and followed Dean down.

    So Cas isn't innocent but not solely to blame for the bitterness in his voice when he says, "Tell me, Dean, how to stop? How do you just wipe off something that might as well have been branded into you?" He takes a step towards Dean, then another. Something feral exploding alive at the heart of him making him wish his grace would just dissolve already so he'd be human. Able to give the anger inside motion, feel the pain of Dean's fists, hit back and bleed for each other. "We are all going to die. The Leviathan -" he pauses, having to manually release his jaw when his whole body clenches at the word, "They are nothing like anything you or I have ever faced. There is no Colt, no demon knife, no angel sword for this breed of evil. When I have to stand next to your brother and watch your body burn I need to know that you-"

    But there's only the taste of Dean which he shouldn't know but somehow does. Soft lips, scraping stubble, fingers braiding into his hair and the feeling of an ocean slamming into him.

    Dean kisses him like Cas' mouth may be the only thing keeping him alive. There's only an instant given for Cas to catch up before Dean is slotting their bodies together, pressing against him hard until all the air between them is gone. Dean's hands frantically searching like a man trying to grapple his way up a cliff. Cas is more sure, fingers sliding up the back of Dean's shirt to find heated skin. He wants to see this, wants to drag his hands down Dean's back, fingertips tracing the hard lines of muscle while Dean is awake and not half dead fresh from the pit. Wants to see this body bare when Dean's the one that has stripped it for him.

    It feels like branches are snapping inside of Dean, Cas can almost hear them. The whole trunk may be splitting apart with the way he's starting to fumble with urgency. Words, barely a whisper, come out of Dean too jumbled for Cas to understand. Expected, what with his tongue being in Cas' mouth. Cas knows it's something he either desperately wants to hear or will give anything not to. He's not kidding himself on his chances, sucking on Dean's tongue and managing to silence him twice now in as many days. 

    The only noises leaving the man now are the small broken gasps that ignite with every breath he manages to take and a deep rumble coming from the back of his throat that may as well be thunder.

    Dean wraps the collar of Cas' shirt tightly around his fist and uses it to slam him back against the wall. Cas lets Dean fling him around, will let Dean do anything but stop at this point. Reality will be back soon and Cas isn't willing to miss a moment of this delirium. He's beyond reasoning with, has been for too long. Cas is willing to sit in this car with his friend and drive it over the cliff together, easily replaced those women with him and his charge in his mind when they played it in the rec room. But that isn't Dean. Dean will return to his senses where the angel can't follow. 

    Cas briefly tries to imagine Dean telling Sam about this, them as a them, and can't. It’s ringing up as either too hilarious or depressing to gauge properly. It's easier terrain to wonder how surprised Sam would be, might not even have realized it was a secret.  Sam who Cas can hear beg, _'You two should really talk about this.'_

    Instead he slides his hands from Dean's narrow waist, down, slipping under the hem of his jeans, fingers toying with the elastic band of his boxers. The reaction is immediate. Pelvises smashed together, Dean's erection digging into his left hip. Cas moves, angles, rising up to press his own against the hardness. The buzz in his nervous system spikes and the noise he makes is pathetic and brutally honest.

    Dean jerks away from  the waist up, cocks still slanted together, and Cas has a moment of panic about to scream, _'Don't talk, just let us have this,'_  but all Dean says is, "Off," in warning before Cas' mouth in under siege again. Dean stops biting his lower lip long enough for Cas' hospital issued shirt to be evicted before he's back at it again. Pushing Cas, shoving, as he's herded backwards towards the bed. Dean has the hands of a hunter, calluses as present as ever - grown back since Cas rebuilt him to factory settings. Everywhere he touches is fire, cells left screaming out in the wake of rough fingers.

    The back of his legs collide with the mattress hard and all it takes is Dean letting go of him for him to fall back against the sheets. Cas is crawling backwards, further onto the small bed while determined hands pull down his thin scrubs in a series of harsh tugs.

    "Shit," Dean hisses when there's nothing left on Cas to strip, palms on pale thighs, squeezing. "Shit."

    Cas readily agrees, swearing still new to him all things considered, but he's fairly sure that _shit_  was created for situations like this. For the way Dean's able to get his own clothes off so fast Cas is dumbfounded at how the remain in one piece. At what lay under them. He'd tell Dean how gorgeous he is but this time he'd actually get punched.

    He reaches up, hands searching for shoulders as Dean's body leans down to meet him. Cas' arms around his neck, legs around his waist, bodies plastered together. Dean moves against him in a way that makes the whole universe tilt a couple degrees. His face so close, expression cut open, eyes a darker green than Cas remembers making them. With Dean's heart beat in his ears he pushes back, up, towards Dean's heat.

    _'Enjoy this while you have it,'_ Cas hears in a voice that could have belonged to any of his brothers. Only the crazed may hear voices but that doesn't mean they’re wrong. Head tilted, neck arched, he presses his mouth against pink lips. He will drown in this, dig into it deep enough that he can bury whatever remained of himself here.

    "I love you," he repeats, this time meaning to.

    There's no definite reaction from Dean, just him trying to smother Cas' mouth with his tongue and teeth, a small hitch in the rhythm of his hips before they start moving with a new purpose.

    It was enough. Cas would remember the pattern of freckles, the feel of muscles and calluses, the smell of Dean's sweat seeping through John's aftershave and it would be enough.

  
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

 

    When Dean comes he swallows down a moan that sounded too much like, ' _Cas_ ,' stared at pink lips to avoid blue, and pretended he couldn't hear his name spilling out of them over the rush of blood in his ears.

 


	3. Nutcases Know Best

    Dean woke up first, he was good at that. This wasn't the first fuck he'd snuck out on, after all. This one should be relatively easy. Cas might be borderline insane these days but Dean knew he didn't have any delusions about this. He'd made the mistake of catching his eye just briefly, in passing really, as Dean had untangled himself from Cas using an overly starched blanket to wipe up the fucking lake of cum trying to glue them together. He knew Cas and he knew what goodbyes looked like even better. Cas understood.

    Couldn't have been more than an hour he was out of it before his eyes had snapped open, feet on the floor and clothes in his hand before his brain was even all systems go. Cas hadn't peeped as Dean got dressed, hadn't even shifted as Dean opened the creaking door and slipped into the corridor. Dean wondered if he was even asleep or faking it for his sake before realizing that it didn't matter. Cas was the one in the mental ward so it said a lot about Dean that between the two of them the angel was the one who had his shit together. He's said his piece, heart laid bare, and while he'd probably spend the next millennia feeling like he'd been involved in an emotional train wreck he could at least find a nugget of comfort in knowing that he had been the one to reach out and try.

    Not Dean. Dean was all but creeping out in the middle of the night like some teenager past curfew. With time and the right combination of pills prescribed Cas could, maybe, find peace. Dean's master plan was finding enough alcohol to drown out the self-loathing long enough each day to function. There was something fundamentally broken in him. He'd chase after Sam barely wanted all over the country but offer him something solid to hold onto, something that could be good, and you might as well book a ticket for the next bus out of town in his name.

    He'll just keep running. Smile through the stabbing pain in his chest, call Sam a bitch when he asks what's wrong, and keep running.

    That's the plan already in progress when his exit is suddenly blocked. The woman is in scrubs, older, and looks less than pleased to see a visitor wandering the halls after hours. Dean's calculating the best way to swing this in his favor when she asks, straight faced, "Have I told you the one about the rabbit and the rabbi?" before bursting into hysterics.

   Dean bothers to take a second look and catalogs her socked feet, the medical bracelet, and uncombed hair. Damn head cases.

    "Yeah, Sweetheart," he assures her, all but pushing his way past as she stands unmovable in the middle of the narrow hall. "It was a real hoot too."  
  
    He's only made it about 20 feet before she calls out, too loud for the short distance, "Are you sure?"

    He spins around, tries not to hiss, "Yes. Yes, I'm sure."  
  
    The last thing he needs right now is to be chased out of a hospital by a bunch of night nurses only to have to red-line it out of the state trying to ditch the flashing lights in his rear view mirror. He listens closely for the sound of rubber soles stampeding across linoleum. Nothing yet.

    Confused, the woman nods, corner of her mouth etched down. One hand buries in her dirty hair. "Okay," she offers, face still turned towards him. And Dean, for some stupid reason, sticks around to hear her say, "If you're sure. It's always the things I don't do that I end up regretting the most."

    He watches her shuffle back into her room unaware of Dean's master plan being torn to shreds.

  
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

  
    When Cas opens his eyes he barely registers the empty bed having expected nothing else. He rolls over, tugging the covers a little higher, to find the sight of Dean lounging in one of the chairs near the window.

    "Are you real?" He asks because he's sunk so low that it needs to be asked.

    "I'm real," Dean assures, thumb tap-tapping on the cheap plastic arm rest.

    "You're still here." It’s not a question but it leads to many. He wasn't ready for this. He sits up, feeling like whatever is about to happen isn't something he can handle lying down.

    "Yep," not standing, not coming closer. "Bed wasn't exactly built for two but you looked like you needed it. Get dressed. You're coming with me."

    Cas sighs, fear twisting knots inside of him, "Dean-"

   "You're coming, Cas," like it's fact, not option. 

     He thinks about saying something childish like, _'Try and make me,'_  something he learned from Dean himself but he lets his guard down long enough to look at Dean and see him. Dean's all there. Set jaw, cocky smile, shoulders slack but Dean's eyes are wide open in a way he never allows. Cas can see inside of him for miles and Dean  _knows_ , wants Cas to see it. He leans forward in his chair, feet now planted firmly, chin stretched out over his knees.

    "I'm in love with you. This is all messed up and we probably can't fix it but I'm not doing this without you. I need you with me."

    There's a lot of reasons not to, so Cas replies, "Okay. I'm with you."

  
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

  
    They're about halfway back to Sam before Dean can get the pain in the ass to stop calling every 5 minutes. Dean's set on hoping that Sam takes one look at them and just knows 'cause every time he tries to figure out where to even start explaining this he can feel the beginning tingles of a panic attack.  
  
    The world was ending again, their team was dwindling, they had no leads, Meg was back in their hair and Dean was having a homo-nervous-breakdown.

    "Dean? Why is this man so intent on getting a slice of this woman's custard pie? Is she a particularly skilled baker?"

       Yet somehow, things were looking up.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading! Let me know what you thought... or else.
> 
> Be sure to check out Pt 2 and 3


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